It was almost an hour later before he finally zoomed off the track. Toni took Birdie’s hand and together they left the stands to find him. He was easy to spot in his bright red race pants and jersey, even though he was completely surrounded by women. And a few men. But Toni only noticed the women. Jeez, not only did they flock to rock star Logan, they also flocked to freestyle motocross Logan.
“Is Logan a slut?” Birdie asked.
Good question.
“He has a lot of sweethearts.”
He certainly did.
Toni squeezed Birdie’s hand. “You aren’t supposed to use that word, remember?”
Logan leaned in close to a woman to hear what she was saying over the noise of the track and then laughed, that charming smile of his turning heads.
“Is there a good word for someone with a lot of sweethearts?” Birdie asked.
Asshole came to mind. Toni knew it wasn’t Logan’s fault that he was gorgeous and talented and fun and outgoing, but she wished she was the only woman who noticed.
“Toni? Is there a good word?”
“Um.” Toni racked her brain for a child-friendly synonym for manwhore. “Popular?”
“Logan sure is pop-a-lure. Did he see all these girls’ boobies?” Birdie looked up at her, her inquisitive eyes enormous behind her thick glasses.
“I don’t think so.” But she couldn’t say for sure. Toni stood on tiptoe and tried waving to catch his attention.
Logan smiled when he spotted them standing at the edge of the gathered crowd. He easily meandered his way to her side.
“There are my girls.” He moved to stand between them and settled one arm around Toni’s waist and his other across Birdie’s shoulders.
“You already have enough girls,” Birdie said.
“A man can never have too many girls.”
Toni’s scowl didn’t lessen even when he kissed her temple.
“Are you ready to head back to the hotel?” he asked in her ear.
She’d been ready to jump his bones, but now she was plain grumpy.
“You were jumping so high!” Birdie said. “And then you did a flip and flew like Superman with your feet out. Was it fun?”
“Very fun.” Logan tugged at one of Birdie’s pigtails.
“Can I try it?”
Logan glanced at Toni, and she gave him a definitely not shake of her head.
“Maybe when you’re older,” he said. “These bikes are for grownups.”
“Do they have loud bikes for kids?”
Logan looked to Toni for assistance, but she was still irritated about his entourage of dirt-bike groupies, so she let him struggle for his own answer.
“I almost forgot,” he said, unzipping a pocket in his race pants and pulling out a small brown paper bag. “I got something for you and your sister at the gift shop.”
Birdie was immediately distracted. “What is it?”
“I’ll give it to you in the car.”
“Let’s go, Toni!” Birdie grabbed Toni’s hand and jerked her in the direction of the entrance. She’d apparently already given up on the idea of a kid-sized loud bike.
Birdie bounced up and down in the limo as she waited for Logan and Toni to settle in the seat. “What is it? What is it?”
“It’s nothing huge,” Logan said.
He reached into the sack and pulled out a pair of gaudy orange and purple race socks. He pulled them apart and handed one to Birdie. “One for you.” And then he put the mate on Toni’s lap. “And one for you.” He retrieved a second pair of socks—baby blue and lime green—and divvied them up between the sisters.
“New socks!” Birdie yelled as if she’d just gotten her own rainbow-farting pony. “Oh, thank you, Logan!”
He grunted in surprise when he got the Birdie tackle-hug treatment and only hesitated a second before hugging her back. “You’re most welcome.”
Toni suddenly wanted to jump his bones again.
Birdie sat back and yanked off her shoes, tugging off her old socks and replacing them with the new. Touched by Logan’s thoughtfulness, Toni had to use one of her new socks to dab away a stray tear before she followed Birdie’s lead and changed into them. They wriggled their matching mismatched socks at him and he laughed, that charming smile of his turning heads again—Toni’s head.
Yep. Bones. Jumped. Now.
Toni was ecstatic to find Mom waiting in the hotel lobby with Susan. Not because she actually wanted to see either of them, but because she needed to hand off her sister so she could get her hands on her man as soon as possible.
“Thanks for visiting.” She gave her mom the quickest of hugs. “Be a good girl for mama.” She kissed Birdie on the cheek. “Later,” she said to Susan and started to back away.
“I don’t want to go on the plane,” Birdie wailed.
“You don’t?” Logan asked.
Birdie shook her head vigorously. “No. I hate them.”
“I love planes,” Logan said.
Birdie looked up at him adoringly. “You do?”
“Yeah. They go even faster and higher than dirt bikes. You can fly through the sky like Superman.” He demonstrated his flying skills—extending his arms and making zoom noises.
Birdie pursed her lips together, obviously struggling with a huge dilemma: fear of flying versus impressing her new friend. The new friend won. The two of them zoomed around the group several times. Susan looked rather annoyed by their childishness, but Mom was smiling. She squeezed Logan’s arm when the two pretend airplanes came to a stop. “Thank you,” she said to him.
He grinned. “No problem.”
“Hello, Logan,” Susan butted in, her tone dripping with something nasty. Disdain?
Logan turned his head to look at her and scowled. “Do I know you?”
“I don’t know,” she said, with a sly smile. “Do you?”
“This is Susan,” Toni said, not really wanting to introduce them. She wanted to get away, get him alone, and get busy.
“It was good to meet you all,” Logan said when he apparently understood Toni’s persistent tug on his elbow as it’s time to go. He gave Susan one last look, patted Birdie on the head, and turned to follow Toni.
“There’s something familiar about that Susan woman,” he said as they stepped onto the elevator.
“Please don’t tell me you’ve slept with her,” Toni pleaded. There wasn’t enough bleach in the world to clean that skank off his dick.
“No. I recognize every woman I’ve ever slept with. I might not remember their names . . .” He turned his head toward her. “What was your name again?”
She slugged him in the ribs.
“No.” He shook his head, still scowling. “I know I never slept with her, but I think I’ve seen her somewhere.”
“She used to be a journalist,” Toni said. “Maybe she interviewed you.” Please let that be all there was between them.
He released a sigh and nodded. “Yeah, that must be it.” He turned toward her and smiled. “So why were you in such a hurry to ditch your adorable little sister?”
“Well,” she said, “there was this hot guy doing all sorts of dangerous stunts on a dirt bike and I thought to myself, damn, I need to get me some of that.” She turned toward him and slid a hand down his belly, stopping just short of touching what she really wanted. “And after he got me excited with his daring, acrobatic feats, I found him surrounded by all sorts of women, which made me wonder if I even stood a chance with him.”
“You do,” he murmured before directing her hand several inches lower.
“And then he bought a little girl some socks which made her incredibly happy.”
“He sounds pretty lame. I ain’t gonna lie.”
She smiled at him, her heart throbbing with the love trying to burst from her chest.
“You’re wrong. He’s amazing.”
“So you still want him? Even after he unapologetically tried to buy a child’s affection with socks?”